


The Clueless Apprentice

by echospool



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Fluff, M/M, Merlin has an apprentice, Modern Day Merlin, POV Original Character, Resurrection, idek, merlin waits for 1500 years
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-09
Updated: 2020-07-09
Packaged: 2021-03-05 06:34:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,510
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25160098
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/echospool/pseuds/echospool
Summary: Merlin takes on a new apprentice in the 21st Century. She has no idea what she's getting into, especially when Merlin takes her on an impromptu trip to a lake for his "anniversary."
Relationships: Merlin/Arthur Pendragon (Merlin)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 76





	The Clueless Apprentice

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by this tumblr post: https://serendipitousmountains.tumblr.com/post/617556481279246336/i-mean-i-like-a-good-merlin-is-really-depressed
> 
> Although I'm not really even sure what this is anymore. I definitely didn't intend to write an OFC POV fic when I set out. /shrug

Merlin jumped off the swing at the top of its arc head first. His newest apprentice gasped, sure that this time Merlin would bust open his skull, but he came to a sudden stop, his nose hovering three inches in the air above a sea of gravel. He planted his hands gently on the ground, and lowered himself down, feather light, before hopping back up and staring at his apprentice, Freya, and spread his arms wide, expectantly.

"Your turn," he said, cocking his head and grinning. Freya knew he was over a thousand years old, the great and powerful sorcerer of legend, but he just reminded her so much of the boys she met in school. Like, all of them, rolled into one. Today he was sporting floral print combat boots, cargo shorts, a yellow polka dot polo shirt, and trans flag suspenders. The first time she saw him he was wearing this outfit at the little bar near her cramped studio apartment. She raised her eyebrow at him. It nearly made her eyeballs bleed.

"What on earth are you wearing?" she asked, handing him a shot of fireball as a welcome to the neighborhood. She knew he must have been new. She would have remembered seeing something like this.

Merlin simply shrugged. "Sorcerers believe in trans rights," he said. That hadn't at all been what she was getting at. It took her a full minute to register what he said, and by then he'd climbed onto the stage and jumped into a version of "Sweet Caroline" with three frat bros that still haunted her nightmares to this day.

He wandered off the stage and she caught up to him. "What do you mean, 'sorcerers' say trans rights? Are you, like, a performer or something?"

He wiggled his fingers at her and picked up a beer off the bar that seemed to come from nowhere. "I dabble," he smiled, and held out his hand for her to shake. "I'm Emil."

"Freya," she said, and signaled the bartender for two more shots.

He paused for a second. "Freya is a very old, very powerful name." She thought that he was just flirting with her, and laughed it off.

"My dad was really into mythology or something. I don't know. My mom doesn't talk about it much." He nodded sagely, and accepted the shot from her. They clinked glasses, tapped the shots onto the bar, and spent the rest of the night talking about everything and nothing. When she tried to close out her tab, the bartender seemed confused, and said that the young man had paid for all her drinks that night. She insisted she needed to get her card back from the bar, but when she checked her wallet, it was tucked safely back inside, as if she'd never surrendered it to open a tab in the first place.

Her hangover the next morning was truly something to behold. When someone started pounding on her door around noon, she was prepared to sucker punch them and go back to sleep for another three days. When she opened the door, Emil was there, this time sporting a blue felt wizard hat with yellow stars stitched on, a pink plaid bathrobe that barely covered his thighs, and necklaces, bracelets, and anklets made of strung together glow sticks. She glanced down. The bathrobe was open and he wore yellow and red heart boxers, and there seemed to be a blue glow stick shining behind the thin material as well. She slammed the door in embarrassment. It took her several fuzzy seconds to even recognize him as the awkward hipster from the night before. He started pounding on her door again, and she grabbed him by the wrist and hauled him inside.

"This is a private building!" she hissed, "Get in here before anyone sees you."

Emil swayed back and forth a bit, as if he were still on a bender. "I have decided," he said, slightly over enunciating, "that it is high time I took on a new apprentice." Freya made her way into the kitchen and poured two glasses of water, barely listening to him. "It's been over three hundred years, you see," he paused to hiccup, "and while that might not seem that long to me, the world has clearly gone astray." He gestured broadly at her apartment, as if to prove a point, before plopping himself down at the kitchen table and gratefully draining the glass of water she handed him.

"I'm very flattered," Freya began, "but you're really not my type."

Emil blew a raspberry at her and shook his head. "You're young enough to be my giggity-great granddaughter. That's disgusting." He looked down at his glass. His gaze seemed to come into focus for the first time all morning - afternoon - and slowly the glass filled back up with cool, clear water. He drained the glass again in a single gulp, let out a satisfied gasp, and looked a bit more human. "You know, you really shouldn't spend so much time at the tavern, Freya."

She was convinced she was just seeing things because of her hangover, but she couldn't tear her eyes away from the glass as he refilled it again, seemingly with the power of his mind. "How did you do that?" she asked.

He wiggled his fingers at her, similarly to how he did last night. "Magic," he said, trying to sound mysterious. He was undercut as the wizard hat toppled from his head onto the kitchen table, the tip landing in the freshly filled glass of water, getting soggy and gross.

Despite her impressive hangover, he kept her up for nearly three days without sleep, trying to convince her of the reality of magic and the fact that he was not Emil, local eccentric, but Merlin, the great and terrible.

Her training as his apprentice was slow going. She read over the books he gave her. It read like pseudo-scientific nonsense, spouting the miasma theory of disease and talking about unicorns and other fanciful creatures. He had to remind her again and again that even though some of the methodology was wrong, the books contained an essential truth. One day she threw a book to the ground in frustration, and suggested that maybe there just wasn't as much magic in the world nowadays as there used to be when he was young. That was the first time she ever caught him looking sad, but he quickly covered for it and gave her a mockingly stern frown.

"Magic is the world. There is never more or less magic than there ever was. It's just that no one believes in it anymore."

She tried again and again at the smallest spells, but nothing seemed to work, no matter how many times he demonstrated it for her. He was the picture of patience, never frustrated or angry with her, but she was angry with herself. Everything that seemed so easy for him refused to manifest for her.

"You picked the wrong apprentice," she whispered, when it seemed like he'd fallen asleep on the couch.

He left quietly that night, while she was still studying. He was gone for days. She hadn't gone a full 48 hours without seeing him since they first met at the bar, and she was afraid he'd never come back. On the fourth night she started to despair. But on the sixth night she decided to prove herself wrong. That there was plenty of magic and that she could be a worthy apprentice after all. She dug out one of her old aromatherapy candles she used to use to cover up the smell of weed smoke whenever her parents were about to come visit, and concentrated hard on it. She whispered a magic word, but nothing happened. She tried emphasizing different syllables. Still nothing. She cracked a beer and tried again. And again. Eventually, the sun went down and came back up, she was drunk, and she'd been staring at a candle for eighteen hours without anything happening. She rolled her eyes at herself, waved her wrist in the direction of the candle, and mumbled the word one last time before passing out. The next thing she knew, Merlin was in her apartment, stomping out the curtain that had caught fire next to the candle. He beamed at her.

"I knew you could do it," he said. She was so happy that she didn't even have room to feel fear about the fact that she'd nearly drunkenly lit her home on fire. Magic was real, and she could do it.

Doing magic, and being any good at magic, however, were very different stories. She'd always been a good, if slightly underachieving student in school. It frustrated her to no end that she didn't seem to have a knack for picking up new spells. She had to work harder at it than anything she'd ever done before. Merlin seemed slightly disappointed at times, but he tried not to let her see.

"You grew up believing that magic isn't real. You have a lot more to overcome than I did, back in the day," he'd say. She thought he was mostly trying to make both of them feel better about his lackluster choice of apprentice, but she didn't fight him. She learned early on that fighting with him was futile. He had a way of brushing off any and all concerns with a quip and a lopsided grin. It was painfully endearing. She even thought she was developing a crush on him for a little bit, but he always deflected her advances. She knew she was far too young for him, but it seemed like there was something else stopping him as well.

One night, after another clumsy attempt to point out how much she liked it when his smile reached his eyes only to have his face fall flat right in front of her, she gave up. "I know you're, like, a million years old. So does that mean that you just, never, you know, have feelings?"

He stared at her blankly for a second before his face softened. He crouched down in front of where she was sitting and tipped her chin up to look him in the eyes.

"You're a charming young lady and some nice sorcerer will be very lucky to court you someday. I had strong feelings, once, and that was enough. When you're older, you'll understand," he smiled gently at her. He moved in to hug her, but she pulled away, still feeling stung from his rejection. He took the hint and pulled back. She looked into his eyes, afraid that he'd judge her for feeling hurt, but the gentle smile was still there. He stood up, and continued on with his lesson. The next time she complimented his smile, she did so honestly, without angling for him to reciprocate. He seemed to notice the shift, and beamed at her even harder, then took off running, expecting her to follow. 

Of course, she did. All the way to the swing set where he currently was trying to teach her how to halt herself mid free-fall. The first time she tried, she landed flat on her face. Her nose smashed right into the gravel, and her vision exploded in a wash of blood. He rushed right to her and healed her instantly, as if nothing had ever happened. He took off the handkerchief he wore around his neck and wiped the blood from her eyes.

"Well," he said, "look on the bright side. Your next attempt can hardly be any worse than that."

They tried five times a night for the next week. In total, she broke her collarbone, cheek, nose, wrist, a rib, and her jaw in the process of trying to stop herself from face planting on the gravel. He healed her up every time.

"Why don't you teach me to do that?" she asked. "With that ability to heal things instantly, we could stop the war in Iraq or something. Maybe even cure cancer."

Merlin looked stricken. He placed his hand over her sprained ankle and his eyes glowed gold, as always, but this time there was no mirth in them. "I've stopped countless wars," he said soberly. "But I've never been able to stop war."

She thought on that for a minute, and thought about asking him a follow up question, but decided against it. She'd gotten to know his moods, and while he was often goofy, funny, or supportive, he occasionally got maudlin. She didn't like seeing that side of him. It felt too private and vulnerable, and he refused to answer too many questions about his past when she asked him, so it seemed like the best idea just to leave him alone.

Tonight was their eighth night on the swing set, and Freya pumped her legs hard back and forth, working up a good arc for her to jump off the swing. She knew, after more than 35 failed attempts, that Merlin would fix her up, no matter the damage, but she still hesitated, not looking forward to the pain of her inevitable failure. She squeezed her eyes shut and at the top of the swing's journey she let go and went soaring through the air. She braced herself for impact, but nothing happened. She slowly opened one eye, then the other, and Merlin was standing below her with his hand up, distractedly looking through his phone in the other hand.

"Um, Merlin?" she said, clearing her throat slightly. He looked startled, and the spell freezing her in the air faltered. She plummeted toward the ground, but at the last second, she murmured the magic word. Three inches from the ground, just like she was supposed to be, she froze to a stop. She stretched her hands out tentatively, and floated to the ground, light as a feather, and landed on her stomach. She flopped around onto her back, getting gravel under her shirt, and smiled up at Merlin.

"Did you see that?" she shouted, "I finally did it!" But Merlin was still staring at his phone, as if he couldn't even hear her.

"What? Oh," he said, distantly. "Yes, nice work. Do you know what day it is?"

Freya picked herself up off the ground, brushing off the stray rocks, disappointed at Merlin's lack of enthusiasm. "It's September 3rd," she said, unsure what he was getting at.

"Damn, I thought that's what this device was trying to tell me." He shoved the phone back into his pocket. "Come on, I'm late," he said, extending a hand to help her off the ground before realizing that she'd already gotten back up.

"Late for what?" she said, trying to mask the sting of him ignoring her success.

"The anniversary!" he said, conjuring a pair of suitcases out of thin air. "Come on, we need to get to the airport." Merlin, of course, dragged his suitcase through the air without a second thought, not pausing for her to drag her suitcase through the gravel, tugging against the loose rocks getting stuck in the luggage's wheels. She grunted, maybe a little performatively. He looked back, annoyed. His eyes glowed, and her suitcase lifted up a couple inches off the ground, freeing her of the gravel's friction, and she jogged slightly to catch up to him.

"Why are we going to the airport?" Freya asked. "Wherever we're going, can't we just teleport?"

Merlin snorted. "I'm a sorcerer, not a fictional scientist. I can't just teleport that far without mucking up spacetime," he said, still hauling his magically conjured suitcase, as if that contradiction made any sense. Freya shook her head, and Merlin sighed. "If you would keep up with your reading, this would be intuitive to you by now." Freya highly doubted that, but didn't want to argue with him further. Merlin was on a mission, and after nine months of study with him, she'd learned to roll with his moods, no matter how random they seemed to be. They always took her somewhere interesting.

Except for this time, when his mood took her to JFK. He was able to magically conjure them tickets and wave their way through security, but apparently he couldn't conjure up a flight to the UK at will. They had to wait with the rest of the passengers. It was a full flight, and they apparently displaced a couple of self-important businessmen who got into a fight with Merlin about the conflicting seat assignments.

Merlin rolled his eyes at the blustery man in front of him, who was going on about how much he paid for the ticket, and didn't kids these days know the value of a dollar? He turned back to Freya and said, "Remember. Do as I say, not as I do," before turning back to the two men and waving his hand. The two businessmen vanished right before them, and no one around them seemed to notice.

"What did you do?" Freya asked, frightened that Merlin might have actually killed two innocent, if obnoxious bystanders in order to secure first class tickets on an international flight.

"Just a minor glamor. They'll keep yelling for a couple hours before they realize no one can see them. I'm sure their very important firm will work out the disagreement with the tickets."

"That seems cruel," Freya said, not sure how to feel about Merlin's sudden zeal for traveling back to his homeland on no notice.

"That's capitalism," he said, and didn't elaborate further, although Freya was pretty sure he was just using a phrase he saw on Twitter once to cover for his bad behavior.

Nearly a full day later they were checked into a hotel, rested, newly fed, and refreshed. Merlin was bouncing off the walls, ready to get wherever it was they were going. As she'd grown to expect of him, he was dressed like a nightmare. He had on a pair of novelty 2002 New Years Eve glasses, a tuxedo t-shirt, a black tulle skirt, his favorite trans flag suspenders, and his habitual floral print combat boots. They stopped by a florist and Merlin picked out a bouquet of wildflowers. The proprietress eyed them suspiciously, and glared when they made such a small purchase on credit card. Freya apologized, explaining that they only had US dollars on them, but before she was even done with her explanation Merlin was already off down the road on foot.

"Are you ready to tell me where we're going yet?" Freya asked, struggling to keep up with Merlin, who seemed to be holding himself back from sprinting to his destination.

"I come here every year," he said. "It's amazing how much has changed. The advent of modern roads is a nice touch. Much easier to get around."

Freya shook her head. This was the best she was going to get from him. He marched along, and eventually they found themselves on a nice footpath leading up to a lake. The water was clear and still. As they got closer, the birdsong that had surrounded them started to disappear, and the wind died down. Merlin slowed as he approached the shore.

The banks were quiet, and undisturbed except for an odd pile of rocks with a wooden plank atop it. Merlin reached out hesitantly for the plank of wood. Freya looked down, and there was something burned into it, but she didn't recognize the script. She looked to Merlin, and for the first time in her acquaintance with him, he looked spooked.

"What does it say?" she asked softly.

Abruptly, he grabbed the plank of wood and tossed it as hard as he could into the lake. He whirled around and snarled at her. "Did you do this?"

She shrunk back from him. "Do what?" she looked around, bewildered, looking for some sort of clue to explain his sudden fury.

"The cairn!" he said, pointing wildly at the stack of rocks. "The plaque. Emrys. How did you learn to write it?"

She stepped backward involuntarily, and tears stung her eyes. Merlin glared at her, and she felt fifteen hundred years of rage concentrated in that single glare. She thought she would collapse from the weight of it. "I don't know what you're talking about," she said softly. He should have looked ridiculous in his novelty New Years Eve glasses, but the absurdity of it all only lent to her terror. For the first time since she met him that night in the bar, she fully grasped that she had rearranged her life, thrown away years of university, a stable - if boring - job, and everything she knew to follow around a mad man with magic powers. She'd read the stories of Merlin, of course, the sorcerer who aged backwards and helped Arthur conquer Albion. She'd never seen him with a long white beard, or with a staff, but intellectually she knew he was dangerous. Especially after he disappeared those two men at the airport. But she'd never felt the reality of the danger until now. His irises glowed dangerously, and she squeezed her eyes shut, just like when she launched herself off the swing, bracing for whatever impact was about to come.

Instead, she heard a thud. She opened one eye tentatively. She saw a rock fall to the ground next to Merlin, along with his 2002 novelty glasses. A blonde man in brown drawstring pants and a red tunic stalked toward them from the roadside.

"Late as ever, Merlin," said the man. Merlin turned slowly, his eyes wide and mouth open, gaping like a fish. He was so slow to move, Freya thought, that it was almost like Merlin didn't want to see whatever might be over his shoulder. The man marched right up to them, laid a heavy hand on Merlin's shoulder, and pulled him around into a bear hug. "It's good to see you, old friend," the stranger said. 

Slowly, belatedly, Merlin's arms raised to return the man's hug. Merlin gripped him tight. Too tight, apparently, as the man coughed slightly and said, "You know, Merlin, I do prefer to breathe."

Merlin suddenly shoved the man away. He stumbled backwards a step, before steadying himself and raising an eyebrow at Merlin.

"I'm late?" Merlin asked. "Me?"

"Well, yes," the man said, confused at Merlin's indignation. "We've been back for weeks. We camped here at the lakeside for a few days. Gwen was sure you'd be here to greet us. Gwaine eventually talked us into a room at the local tavern. Gwen's been inconsolable ever since. I came here to retrace our steps, and figure out what's become of Camelot. Good thing I found your lazy ass." The man crossed his arms and smirked.

Merlin burst out laughing. The man frowned. "I don't think Gwen would be happy to know you're laughing at her pain," he said.

Freya knew she shouldn't interrupt whatever was happening here, but the same instinct that called to her to buy Merlin drinks that first night called out to her here. She stepped forward slightly and cleared her throat. "Excuse me," she said, trying her best to be polite under the circumstances. "What exactly is going on here?"

The man's face fell for a second when he noticed her before he caught himself and turned to Merlin. "You're late because you finally got yourself a girlfriend?" he asked.

Merlin looked back and forth between Freya and the man. "What? No. No," he shook his head vigorously. He was a little too quick to deny a relationship for Freya's taste. What was wrong with her, after all? Merlin took a deep breath and seemed to collect himself. "Arthur, may I present my current apprentice, Freya. Freya, this is King Arthur."

Freya's blood ran cold. She knew Merlin was the real deal, of course. He'd gone through great pains to prove that to her. But King Arthur? He was just a composite figure. The stuff of legends. Otherwise, Merlin surely would have mentioned him before, right?

"Oh good," Arthur said, straightening up a little. "We need someone to help polish all the armor. It's no use trying to find a good servant in these parts."

Merlin stiffened. "No, Arthur. Not that kind of apprentice." If Freya didn't know any better, she could have sworn he was bracing himself for something.

Arthur looked back at Freya again. Really looked at her. Where he'd been warm, even humorous before, his gaze seemed cold and calculating now. "I see," Arthur said slowly. "So you're still," he waved his hand vaguely in the air, "like that."

Merlin clenched his jaw for a second before his shoulders slumped. "Yes, Arthur. I'm still a sorcerer, if that's what you mean."

Arthur smiled slightly, but the air still remained chilly between the two of them. "I did tell you to never change," Arthur said. "And I meant that. But still, you haven't given me much time to get used to it, you'll have to admit."

Merlin let out a sort of half-sob, half-laugh. "Not enough time? You've been gone for fifteen hundred years. I've been by myself. For fifteen hundred years."

Arthur's face went blank as he absorbed the information. "You mean," he said, "you've been here this entire time?"

"Of course I've been here!" Merlin shouted, taking a step toward Arthur. "I told you I'd always be here. And I have, haven't I? Whenever you needed me? You.....you clotpole." Merlin balled his fists tightly, nearly shaking, whether with rage or with desperate laughter, Freya couldn't tell.

Arthur surged forward to meet Merlin, and pulled him into a fierce embrace, kissing Merlin full on the lips so suddenly that Freya blushed and turned away. She didn't generally consider herself a prude, but the show of affection was so sudden, and so intimate that she felt embarrassed to witness it. After a second that lasted a lifetime, Merlin reluctantly pulled himself back.

"I'm sorry, did you say that Gwaine talked his way into getting you a hotel room without modern clothes or currency?" he asked.

"I kiss you for the first time in fifteen hundred years, and you ask about Gwaine's bartering skills?" Arthur responded, pouting slightly. Merlin laughed and pulled him in once more.

After another long moment Freya cleared her throat, staring awkwardly at her feet. The two men pulled away, flushed, and grinning at each other like fools. Then Arthur glanced down at Merlin. "What in God's name are you wearing?" he asked, his brow furrowing as he noticed the tulle skirt brushing up against his thighs.

Merlin shrugged. "Sorcerers believe in trans rights," he said, and went back to grab Freya by the arm. "Come on. We shouldn't keep Gwen waiting."

"I don't understand half of what just came out of your mouth," Arthur grumbled, but grabbed Merlin's free hand and led them back up the road.

"It's okay, sire," said Freya, hoping she got the honorific right. "You get used to it."


End file.
